Yet tent or palace all were the same. All strove to teach the same message. To persuade all who came to listen or who could be persuaded to pay attention to accept the Universal teaching of complete Brotherhood. That no man was an island. That the pain of one was the pain of all. That all shared the burden of a common heritage. That all belonged to the Corpus Humanite. That once each could look at the other and say, there, but for the grace of God, go I, the millennium would have arrived.

He would never see it. No monk now alive would ever see it. Men bred too fast and traveled too far for that. They rested on too many worlds scattered throughout the galaxy and were subjected to too many strains. But, eventually, it would come. It was an article of faith to believe that. The purpose of his being.

"Brother!" A man rose from where he'd been squatting in the dirt and mud at the side of the track. He was thin, his face yellowed with jaundice, his teeth chattering with cold. He smelt of suppurating pus; the sickly sweet odor of tissue-decay. The hand he extended was like a claw, thin, quivering. "Brother. For the love of God help me!"

"Ask, brother, and if it is possible it will be given."

"I'm ill. Rotten with sores and something else. Starving. I can't get work. And I-I've…"

"The church is waiting," said Brother Eldon quietly. "Enter it, kneel beneath the benediction light, confess and receive forgiveness. Medicines are available and they will be given."

"Brother, will you speak for me to Major Khaftle? He-"

"One thing at a time, brother." Eldon was insistent. "First you must be given what help we have. After, well, we shall see. Come now."

He took the quivering claw into his hand, feeling the febrile heat of the skin, recognizing the fever, the disease. The man was dying and would die despite the antibiotics they could give. But he would not die alone and he would die in peace. Brother Veac would see to that.